I believe that “finishing” skill lines should be something that Anet does next before new specializations. Such as how warrior has no elite shout, or ele has no elite signet, or necro has no elite well.
TL;DR
Our elite well should be a fire field that pulses 1s of burning, 1s of retaliation and direct damage for 5 seconds.
Anyhow, this is my thought process in thinking of a well elite for necromancer:
-“What do wells do?”
-“AOE things”
-“Should it inflict CC?”
-“No, chilled to the bone and flesh golem already does”
-“Mesmer well also CCs”
-“There is too much CC spam already in PvP/WvW”
-“Should it deal high damage?”
-“Ehhh… we already have 2 wells that do this”
-“Should it affect conditions on allies?”
-“Nah, that would clash with well of power in some way”
-“Should it mess with boons or conditions on enemies”
-“…no that would clash with well of corruption”
-“What about something totally different…”
-“Resistance? No that doesn’t really make sense for the class and our abilities.”
-“Should it siphon health or heal in some way?”
-“…no we have a trait designed for that”
-“What about changing the type of field?”
-“Well of Blood is a light field. Useful in PvE for whirl to clear condis.”
-“Light fields getting blasted grant retaliation.”
-“Retaliation used to be/sort of is a theme of necromancers…”
-“Wells do aid allies in some way through field effects and protection from trait”
-“What if our elite well grants pulsing retaliation to allies?”
-“That could work. That’s unique, useful and makes sense for our class.”
-“Sounds neat with the trait. Elite wells grants protection and retaliation. Nice.”
-“What about the field type? It shouldn’t be another dark field.”
-“Ice could work but… chill is very prevalent already on our class”
-“Wouldn’t really be anything special, either”
-“It shouldn’t be a lightning field. We have a ton of poison fields already.”
-“What about a fire field?”
-“Smoke field? Ehh… stealth or blind with whirl? I don’t think so.”
-“Well of darkness already blinds and stealth doesn’t make sense for base necro”
-“I think fire could work. Duumfire is currently our only access.”
-“We have no wells for condis unless you count well of darkness with chilling darkness.”
-“Should we really have 1-off well designed for condis while the others aren’t?”
-“Maybe the well should pulse 1s of burn in addition to direct damage?”
-“Makes sense so far I think… doesn’t seem to class with our other elites.”
-“Plague is more used for survivability so it doesn’t seem to class with that”
-“We have no elites that directly aid allies yet”
-“We have some cute pretend ways to grant allies might (Blood is Power)”
-“Fire field makes sense”
-“Does retaliation damage increase as might increases? Probably. It should.”
-“Our trait causes wells to siphon. Does siphon damage increase with might? Idk.”
-“Our well trait should pulse 1s of protection every pulse…”
-“Self fire aura could be cool for necromancer”
-“Elite well should be a fire field that pulses 1s of burning, 1s of retaliation and…?
-”Should it also just do direct damage?"
-“How much damage?”
-“It should probably additionally just do direct damage. Don’t want to get too crazy.”
-“I don’t know how much damage is too much or not enough.”
-“It probably shouldn’t do more damage than well of suffering”
-“What should the cooldown be? 60s?”
-“Sounds good to me.”
-“5s duration?”
-“Sure why not”
-“Why is well of suffering 6s duration and the other wells are 5s duration?”
-“Please nerf well of suffering to 5s duration to help my OCD”
-“Whatever, 5s duration should be fine for elite well”
-“What should the elite well be called?”
-“I shall google synonyms for burning!”
-“Searing?”
-“Sweltering sounds cool”
-“I shall google the meaning of sweltering!”
-“Well of Sweltering. Why not.”
TL;DR
Our elite well should be a fire field that pulses 1s of burning, 1s of retaliation and direct damage for 5 seconds.